


Watering The Flowers

by Gardian



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Hurt Lance, Hurt Lance (Voltron), Langst, M/M, Self Harm, schizophrenia lance, trigger warning
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-10-16
Updated: 2017-10-16
Packaged: 2019-01-18 05:18:43
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 3,403
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12381699
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Gardian/pseuds/Gardian
Summary: Lance has been living with being unable to tell what is real and what is not his whole life. He can handle himself...right? What will Lance do when his team finds out that he has schizophrenia? Will they support him? or question if he really has what it takes to be a paladin of Voltron and save the universe, when he can't even save himself.





	1. Chapter 1

Lance was running out of pills and time.   
With every pill he came closer and closer to the moment when he would run out and it would happen again.  
He couldn’t remember the first time it happened, but he could remember the last. He had woken up in a hospital bed in the Garrison with Hunk sobbing at his bed side asking him why he never told him.  
Why Lance never told anyone he was schizophrenic.  
Ever morning in the castle he would take a pill and every morning Hunk would ask him how many left.  
Lance would always smile and answer with “loads” just so that his best friend wouldn’t worry. However he only had one left. And that one he managed to lose down the drain of his sink.  
He had no pills…  
Now he just had to wait for the inevitable.  
———————————–  
Allura decided for the days bonding exercise that the Paladins were to do yard work in the large green house filled with various alien plants.  
She said the idea was to show the team that something beautiful could come from their hard work.  
Most of the Paladins except the leader figured she just wanted a nice place to take Shiro on a date to within the castle.  
So they began to work and everyone hated it.   
Pidge practically hissed at any form of nature and was just given a squirt bottle and told to try not to have a mental breakdown.  
Hunk spent more time picking various alien fruit and vegetables then doing any actual gardening.  
Shiro trying to lead by example followed the list of chores created by Corran to help them, but it was clear that he hated every second of it and wished death upon the plants after only an hour.  
Keith did actually try, but after getting a little too scissor happy when trimming a hedge and nearly taking Pidge’s head off, everyone decided it would be a good idea if he were to just work on flower arrangement.  
Lance however couldn’t be happier. He was humming the entire time he worked, offering to help anyone that needed it. Hunk assumed that the working in a garden reminded Lance of earth so didn’t think anything was wrong when Lance got a far off look about him and mumbled something about going to water the flowers.  
However after ten minutes and no Lance, Keith went looking for him annoyed that it seemed the blue paladin had ditched them.   
Keith found Lance standing in front of a table filled with various flowers.  
The first thing that caught his attention was the lack of a watering can. All that was there was a old rusty trowel tossed to the side glimmering with fresh blood.  
Keith did a double take. Yep that was blood alright.  
He stepped closer to ask Lance what had happened when he saw exactly what Lance was doing.  
“Lance… Oh my God…”  
Lance was standing with his wrist cut open in a jagged line bleeding onto one of the flowers. He seemed to be muttering to himself and completely unaware of what was going on around him.  
“Hey Keith can you and Lance help me- holy Quiznark!”  
Unlike Keith, Hunk didn’t freeze. He pulled off his shirt and used it to tightly wrap Lance’s wrist applying pressure to the wound to try and stop the bleeding.  
“Buddy you with me?” Hunk asked gently pushing Lance onto an upturned bucket so he could sit down.  
Lance blinked blearily, it was clear he wasn’t quite all there at the moment. “Hunk?” He asked a large smile stretching across his face.   
“Yeah bud its me. I’m here.” Hunks voice was filled with so much false cheer that Keith cringed. “Do you want to tell me what you were doing?”  
Lance pointed at the group of bloody flowers. “They needed water but I didn’t have any, but then someone said that humans are filled with water. So I opened myself up and watered the flowers like I was meant to.” He beamed sounding too heart breakingly proud of himself.  
“Yeah bud you did a good job with the flowers, but can you do me a favour?”  
Lance’s expression turned serious “don’t worry Leo’s not here.”  
This caused Hunk to sigh with relief “good that’s good. But no I want to you to listen to my voice ok. Ignore everything else you see and hear and only listen to me.”  
Lance nodded his eyes drooping slightly and his skin had gone a sickly pale grey from the blood loss.   
“Good, I’m going to ask Keith to call Shiro then we’re gonna put you In a healing pod to fix up you wrist, then when you get out we’re gonna have dinner and no one will be mad at you ok.”  
Hunk continued to talk as Keith getting the hint ran to get Shiro.  
They returned to find Lance with his head resting on Hunks lap as Hunk spoke softly to him describing the trees, the flowers, even the stars visible through the glass ceiling.  
Shiro took one look at the near unconscious Lance and scooped the boy up, running him to the infirmary without so much as a single word asking for an explanation.  
———————————–  
Lance had been in the healing pod for almost an hour when the other Paladins along with Allura and Corran demanded an explanation.  
“Lance has schizophrenia.”  
Hunk paused as his team let out an audible gasp, Pidge putting their hands over their mouth feeling a sharp stab of guilt for never realising despite all the time they spent together back at the Garrison.  
“I do not understand what this is…” Allura admitted.  
“It’s a mental illness that causes people to erm hallucinate and sometimes not know what’s real or not.” Shiro supplied as best he could.  
“Oh…” was all the princess could say glancing at the blue paladin in the healing pod.  
“Lance can control it with meds but…” Hunk trailed off looking at the floor.  
Allura didn’t need him to answer. Before she dragged them into this war and light years away from home.  
“Who’s Leo?” Keith asked remembering the conversation he had over heard.  
Hunk looked a uncomfortable “Leo’s one of Lance’s hallucinations, he’s usually the one that tells him to hurt people or more commonly himself… didn’t you ever wonder why you never see his arms?”  
Keith paled. He had always assumed that Lance was just some egotistical guy from a big family. He had stupidly assumed that just because he never saw anything wrong that Lance must be fine. Keith felt like an idiot.  
They all did.  
However they were pulled out of their guilt filled thoughts by a hiss from the healing pod and Lance tumbling out into Hunks arms.  
He looked up at everyone taking in their concerned looks and groaned. “So you guys know then?”  
“How couldn’t you tell us something so important!” Pidge snapped tears in their eyes.  
“They have a point Lance. What if this had happened during a mission.” Shiro crossed his arms looking down at the boy disappointedly.  
“I…I…” Lance stammered his grip on Hunk tightening.  
“Ok guys that’s enough.” Hunk said in a way that told the others it wasn’t a request and doing anything else to upset Lance would result in some serious consequences.  
“Hunk is right, now is not the time to be asking such questions. Now is the time for solutions.” Corran fished a orange plastic bottle from his pocket. “I hope you don’t mind but I retrieved this from your room and believe I may be able to recreate the medication.”  
Lance looked like he was going to cry and buried his face into Hunks shoulder mumbling something.  
Hunk chucked looking down at him with a soft smile. “I think that’s a thank you.”  
Lance nodded before looking up at Hunks whispering something the others couldn’t hear but caused Hunks to start laughing.  
“Yeah bud, we can have dinner now.”


	2. Chapter 2

Tension had be high ever since Pidge’s headphones were broken and no one owned up to it.  
Everyone was in a bad mood, not talking or trusting each other.  
Allura saw only one solution.  
To abandon the Paladins on a forest planet without their armour or bayards with only emergency supplies.

“Well this sucks” Lance moaned looking through the bag of supplies finding only one large blanket between the five of them and only enough food to last two days if they rationed.  
“It could be worse, at least the planet doesn’t seem hostile.” Shiro shrugged from where him and Pidge were building a makeshift shelter.  
“I only hope they remembered to pack my meds.” Lance sighed continuing his rooting.   
All the others stopped in their tasks.  
It had been a couple weeks since the garden incident and everyone had been tip toeing around the subject of Lance and his episodes.  
Well everyone but Hunk “don’t worry Buddy I got them here.” He produced the full orange plastic container from his pocket and gave it a little shake causing the pills to rattle around.  
“Thanks Hunk.” Lance sighed standing up and joining him building a fire.

By time night fell Keith had returned from hunting with a few alien rabbits that Hunk cooked while everyone else sat round the fire.  
“You know for a survival bonding trip, this is actually kinda nice.” Lance sighed leaning back against a tree while the others nodded in agreement.  
For a moment everything was peaceful.  
Then that moment passed and the ground collapsed beneath them.

The sudden earthquake had caused the thin piece of rock they had set up camp on to fall into a cave network.  
Lance sat up rubbing his head as he looked around the dark cavern he had fallen into.  
His arm hurt but didn’t feel broken so that was good.  
The problem was he couldn’t see any of the others.  
“Hello?”   
His voice echoed throughout the empty space.  
“Guys? Hunk? Shiro? Pidge?… Keith?”  
Nothing no reply.  
Lance stretched his hands out in front of him hitting the cold stone wall.  
He was trapped in a small cavern only about a arms width in diameter. He felt around and found what could be the bottom of a ledge but was just out of his reach.  
Lance sighed, didn’t look like he was getting out of here anytime soon.  
He slid down to the wet floor drawing his knees close to his chest as he waited and listened.  
At some point he must of fallen asleep because when he woke he heard someone yelling.  
“Hello?” Lance called.  
“Lance?” The voice replied.  
A head suddenly appeared over the ledge holding a small light.  
Lance realised it was Keith.  
“Holy quiznark, I’ve never been so glad to see you Mullet.”  
“Likewise.” He smirked offering down a hand to pull him up.  
Lance tried to lift his hand high enough but a jolt of pain reminded him of his injured arm.   
Keith noticed the look of pain and lowered his light slightly to see the blood stained limb.   
“Fuck”  
“Language” Lance chuckled.  
“I don’t know how I’m going to get you out of there…” Keith sighed. “Guess we just have to hope one of the others gets out and calls Allura.”  
“Don’t worry I’m sure Pidge has gotten out by now. That little gremlin practically lives in the vents so I’m sure a little underground cave system is nothing.” Lance chuckled glad to see a small smile forcing its way onto Keith’s face.  
A small beeping noise came from Lance’s watch causing the blue paladin to pale. “I don’t suppose you found my meds after you fell… did you?”  
Keith’s eyes widened “shit Lance… what do I do? How do I keep you here I-”  
“Keith buddy calm down. Missing a dosage just makes it more likely something will happen. It’s not a definite. And if you keep talking to me it may work out fine.”  
Keith seemed to calm down slightly at this but still seemed consumed by worry, not able to forget the sight of Lance standing over the plants bleeding from cuts in his wrists.  
“Ok…ok, so what do you want to talk about?” Keith asked taking a shaky breath.  
Lance shrugged in response causing Keith to groan in frustration.  
“Ok what about the ocean? Your always talking how much you miss it.”  
A fond look came across Lance’s face “I really do. I miss swimming against the current and the feeling of wet sand beneath my feet. I miss collecting sea glass and shell with my little brother and sister.”  
Lance rambled on about the ocean for about 20 minutes before Keith noticed Lance had the same far away look he had last time he had slipped away.  
“L-Lance? You still with me?”  
“Mmhm” Lance hummed his expression suddenly turning to panic. “Keith! The water its rising! Get me out!” He yelled frantically clawing at the walls.  
“Lance you need to calm down there’s no water.” Keith tried to explain.  
“No there is! Its getting higher! Please pull me up! I don’t want to drown!” He yelled scrapping his finger nails so hard against the rock that one came off and the others were split and bleeding.  
Keith knew this was bad. Lance could seriously hurt himself if this kept up. His thoughts turned to Hunk explaining that the best way to deal with situation was to try and calm Lance down and talk him out of what he’s doing.  
Keith tried to swallow the lump in his throat. “Lance..erm you can swim remember. You just need to swim up with the water.”  
Lance seemed to calm down slightly as he began to move his arms in what would a comical fashion if not for the circumstances. “Good buddy j-just concentrate on treading water and you’ll be just fine.”  
“Lance? Keith?”  
Shiro’s voice called from above as he scaled down the rock on a line.  
“Here Shiro!” Keith called back.  
Shiro landed next to him. “You ok? Where’s Lance?” He asked before following where Keith gestured to see Lance frantically moving his arms with tears falling down his face.   
Shiro cursed softly under his breath. “I knew coming here was a bad idea.”  
He dropped a line down to Lance and after a bit of coaxing was able to get him to the surface.  
He was sedated and placed into the pods for an hour to heal the damage done to his hands. When he came out and saw all the worried faces of his friends Lance broke down sobbing.   
“It happened again! I’m sorry I’m so sorry I’m such a useless paladin.”  
“You have nothing to apologise for Lance. This is my fault for sending you all on this bonding exercise. I never dreamed the planet would be unstable.” Allura said as she wrapped him up in a hug.  
Hunk stepped forward joining the hug"it’s not your fault princess it’s mine.“ He added guiltily “I had his meds, if I had just given them to him before the earthquake then it wouldn’t of happened.  
"I should of gotten out and called for help quicker instead of waisting time looking for everyone.” Pidge mumbled throwing her arms around Lance’s torso.  
“I’m the leader, looking after my team is responsibility, I’m so so sorry Lance.” Shiro placed a hand on Lance’s shoulder.  
“No… its my fault I couldn’t keep you here, I let slip off.” Keith grumbled too awkward to join the hug.  
After a few moment Lance looked up “let’s just move on ok? No point in feeling guilty…”

After that it was decided that every paladin would carry a small bottle of Lance’s medication on them when they went out on missions just in case.  
Lance pretended it didn’t bother him, but it felt like with his team constantly monitoring him they were just admitting to something Lance had known since day one.  
That he was the weakest link.


	3. Chapter 3

When Lance woke up and found his mama sitting on the edge of his bed he almost cried with relief.  
It was a dream.  
He wasn’t in space, he was home and he was safe.  
“Mama?”   
She smiled brushing her fingers across Lance’s face.  
“Yes my baby. I’m here.  
Lance choked on a sob. “Oh mama I missed you so much. I didn’t think i would ever see you again.”  
“I know, but I’m here my love. I’m here and your safe and your loved.”  
Lance launched himself towards her open arms wanting a hug more then anything else in the universe.  
However when he went tumbling to the floor and he looked up at not his childhood bedroom and his mama but his paladin quarters, Lance realised what had happened.  
After the last mission they had all been exhausted and had all gone straight to bed.  
Lance had missed his last dosage and Hunk had been too tired to remind him.  
Lance stared numbly at where his mama had been sitting.  
It had seemed so real.  
It felt like home.  
He didn’t even care that tears were falling freely.  
He didn’t feel sad, but a sense of overwhelming loss that only came from having someone you love suddenly taken away from you.  
Lance slid to the floor, curling up in a ball and sobbing quietly.  
“Shhh baby, you are loved, you are cherished, you are needed, you are not a seventh wheel.”  
Lance put his hands over his ears “and you mama… your not real not matter how much I want and need you to be.”

Hours later Hunk came running into Lance’s room panicked and holding his pill bottle.  
Finding his best friend crying and muttering to himself broke Hunks heart.  
“I’m sorry buddy, I’m here now.” He whispered as he pulled Lance onto his lap and just sat there cuddling him until the crying stopped.


	4. Chapter 4

“Lance! Lance help me!”  
Lance ran through the halls following the sounds of Keith’s frantic yells.  
“KEITH!” He screamed upon finding the red paladin laying on the floor in a pool of blood.  
“Oh god!” Lance was shaking as he propped to his knees not even caring that the blood was soaking into his pants.  
Keith was too pale, his eyes dropping seeming like the effort just to stay awake was more then he could take.  
Lance’s eyes fell on the stab wound in his gut and didn’t waist time and began applying pressure to the wound.  
“D-don’t worry buddy, you’ll be fine just stay awake ok.” Lance tried to keep his voice calm but was failing miserably.  
The worrying thing was that Keith didn’t seem to notice. He was just staring numbly at the ceiling like he hadn’t heard a thing.  
“Help! Someone please! HELP!” Lance screamed and screamed as Keith began to close his eyes.  
“PLEASE HELP!”  
“Lance what’s wrong!”  
Suddenly Keith was gone as was the blood on the ground.  
Lance was on his own kneeling on the floor as Keith stared down at him.  
Keith was… fine.  
His skin was its usual healthy pale not the grey tint from blood loss.  
His beautiful purple eyes looked over him wide with fear.  
He wasn’t dying…  
So that could only mean…  
The tears began to fall down Lances cheeks as he threw himself at Keith knocking the two of them to the floor.  
“What?! Lance?” Keith asked landing with an “umph” on the ground.  
Lance balled his fists in Keith’s shirt hiding his tear stained face in his chest.  
“I thought you were dead! I thought you died!” Lance sobbed.  
Keith hesitated for a moment before he pulled Lance into his arms cradling him close.  
They had been on a bad mission ending up with pretty much everyone needing to use a pod.  
Keith was the first out closely followed by Lance.  
Keith had been so wrapped up in checking the others were ok, that he had forgotten to make sure Lance took his meds.  
He had only realised the blue paladin was missing when he heard the desperate yells for help.  
Now as Keith held the sobbing Lance, the red paladin knew he messed up and anything Hunk would do to him for letting his best friend get in such a state wouldn’t be half as bad as what he wanted to do to himself for making the guy he loved look so miserably broken.

**Author's Note:**

> Also on my Tumblr langsty-mc-langstface


End file.
